THEIR CHILDREN ARE ABROAD, OURS ARE KIDNAPPED: Eleven Years After Chibok, Why Nigeria Still Cannot Protect Its Schoolchildren

By Alifa Daniel (Editorial Consultant), with additional reporting drawn from the internet

More than a decade after the abduction of 276 schoolgirls in Chibok shocked the world and triggered global outrage, Nigerian children are still being kidnapped from classrooms.

The latest case in Oyo State has once again exposed a painful reality: despite years of promises, policy declarations and security operations, schools remain among the country’s softest targets.

But beyond the security concerns, the latest abduction has reopened a deeper and more uncomfortable debate about class, leadership and whose lives matter most in Nigeria.

Speaking on the floor of the House of Representatives, Hon. Bamidele Salam delivered what many observers have described as one of the most powerful parliamentary interventions on insecurity in recent years.

Using a traditional Yoruba proverb, Salam lamented what he sees as a dangerous indifference to tragedies affecting ordinary Nigerians.

“There is a saying among the Yoruba people that if a lion comes into a village and kills the children of the poor, there may be no noise, there may be no mourning. But the day the lion comes into the village and kills a child of the king, the whole city is turned into a graveyard.”

His words captured the anger and frustration of many Nigerians who have watched schoolchildren repeatedly become targets of kidnappers while public outrage often fades after each incident.

The question Salam posed was simple but devastating: Would Nigeria react differently if the children being kidnapped belonged to the country’s most powerful families?

A Decade of Trauma

From Chibok in 2014 to the latest abduction in Oyo State in 2026, school kidnappings have become one of the most disturbing features of Nigeria’s security landscape.

The crisis has evolved through three distinct phases.

First came Boko Haram’s ideological attacks on Western education.

Then came the emergence of bandit groups who discovered that schools offered opportunities for mass kidnappings and ransom negotiations.

Today, school abduction has become a criminal enterprise that cuts across regions and increasingly threatens communities beyond the traditional conflict zones.

Yet despite numerous commissions, security reviews and promises of reform, the pattern remains largely unchanged.

Children go to school.

Gunmen arrive.

Students disappear into forests.

Families wait.

Governments negotiate.

The nation mourns.

And then it happens again.

“Most of Our Children Attend Private Schools”

Perhaps the most politically explosive part of Salam’s speech was his suggestion that the ruling elite are insulated from the consequences of insecurity.

According to him, the distance between policymakers and the victims of school kidnappings may partly explain the slow pace of reform.

“For reasons we all know, most of the children of those of us who are in leadership positions today attend private schools.”

He continued: “Some of them outside the Republic of Nigeria because we can afford it.”

The statement struck a nerve because it reflected a reality many Nigerians recognise.

Public schools are overwhelmingly attended by children from low-income and middle-income families.

Meanwhile, many politicians, senior civil servants and business elites educate their children in private institutions, often with extensive security arrangements.

For millions of ordinary Nigerians, however, public education remains the only affordable option.

And it is these schools that have increasingly become targets.

Salam drew attention to the stark inequality embedded within the crisis.

“But the children of the poor, labourers, teachers and ordinary citizens attend public schools. We cannot afford to close our eyes to the dangers that these children and their teachers face every day.”

The statement transformed the debate from one about security alone to one about social justice.

Eleven Years of School Kidnappings

The chronology of major school abductions reveals a troubling pattern.

2014 – Chibok under President Goodluck Jonathan
276 girls abducted.

2018 under Late President Muhammadu Buhari –

Dapchi
More than 100 girls abducted.

2020 – Kankara
Hundreds of students seized.

2021 – The Year of Mass Abductions
Kagara.
Jangebe.
Afaka.
Greenfield University.
Tegina.
Bethel Baptist High School.

The attacks came so frequently that many parents became afraid to send their children to boarding schools.

2023 – 2026 under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu –

The geography may change.

The victims may change.

But the vulnerability remains.

“If We Can Protect Politicians, We Can Protect Schoolchildren”

Salam rejected arguments that Nigeria lacks the capacity to secure educational institutions.
His response was direct.

“I disagree with those who say we cannot protect all schools.”

Then came perhaps the most quoted line from his speech.

“If we can protect thousands of public office holders in Nigeria, we can protect the children of the poor who attend public schools and the teachers who serve them.”

The statement challenges one of the central assumptions that has shaped discussions about school security.

Successive governments have often argued that the sheer number of schools makes comprehensive protection difficult.

Salam’s argument is that the issue is not capability but priority.

Nigeria already deploys extensive security resources to protect government officials, political office holders and strategic assets.

The question, therefore, is whether schoolchildren are considered equally important.

The tragedy of school kidnappings is not merely that they occur.

It is that they continue occurring after eleven years of experience.

Nigeria has studied the problem.

It has documented the problem.

It has held conferences on the problem.

It has launched initiatives to address the problem.

Yet children remain vulnerable.

The latest Oyo incident has therefore become a symbol of a broader national failure.

Not simply a failure of intelligence.

Not merely a failure of policing.

But a failure of political urgency.

Solutions

Salam’s recommendation is straightforward.

“The country has reached a point where safeguarding educational institutions should be treated as a national emergency.”

A comprehensive solution would require: A dedicated national school protection framework.

Full implementation of the Safe Schools Initiative.

Security technology and surveillance systems.

Better intelligence gathering.

Community-based early warning networks.

Rapid-response security units around vulnerable schools.

Economic programmes that reduce recruitment into criminal groups.

Stronger prosecution of kidnappers and ransom networks.

The Question we Cannot Avoid

Eleven years after Chibok, one question continues to haunt the nation.

It is the same question that echoes through Salam’s speech.

If the children being abducted every year were predominantly the sons and daughters of governors, ministers, senators and powerful business leaders, would Nigeria still be debating how to secure its schools?

Or would protecting schools already be treated as the national emergency that Salam says it is?

Until that question is answered through action rather than rhetoric, millions of Nigerian parents will continue sending their children to school with a fear that should not exist in any society: the fear that education itself has become a security risk.